Posted By Randy Miller On April 24, 2013 @ 12:31 am In Uncategorized | No Comments

[1]

Kimmo Timonen was fourth among NHL defensemen with 29 points.

Flyers GM Paul Holmgren met with beat writers before Tuesday night’s game with Boston to talk about defenseman Kimmo Timonen being done for the season with a compression fracture in his right foot.

Here is the transcript:

Q: Paul, can you give us some specifics on Timonen’s injury because he was wearing that boot for quite awhile?

“I’m not sure that’s related. This particular thing has been bugging him for a couple weeks and every time we want to go further than an x-ray with it, maybe get an MRI take a little deeper look, Kimmo said no it feels better. So we just kind of put it aside. He went and got an MRI yesterday and it showed this compression fracture and the doctor thought that because of where it is the potential risk of doing something much worse if he were to get hit there in that same spot is asking for trouble. So we just shut him down.”

Q: If you were still in the playoff race, do you think Timonen would still be playing?

“That’s a good question. I would probably say no just because of the potential.”

Q: Is this something that will need surgery?

“No.”

Q: What’s the difference between a compression fracture and say a chipped fracture?

“It’s like an indentation but if he were to get hit it could spread into a full fracture in a real bad spot.”

Q: So time is the only thing that can help it out then?

“Yeah.”

Q: What does it say about Kimmo that he probably had an idea there was something wrong?

“Yeah, Kimmo hates missing games. He was decimated yesterday when we called him and told him this is what we were doing. He wasn’t in a very good mood this morning either when we were talking. He just hates missing games. So he’s obviously a very tough competitor.”

Q: Huskins has been practicing. Will he be able to play Thursday against the NY Islanders?

“We’ll see how it goes. He made it through practice today. I don’t think there’s any issues with concussions.”

Q: This is 4 out of your top 5 defensemen now done for the season. How much of that do you think has played a role of this team missing the playoffs?

“Good teams fight through stuff like this. We just didn’t fight through. Is that a factor? Probably, but at the same time you need to fight through those things and we didn’t.”

Q: In reference to Lauridsen, younger defenseman?

“I guess the most exciting part for me is the chance to see some of those guys. When Oliver went in the lineup we were still in the playoff race. We had a chance to get in anyways. I think he’s played pretty good. Manning on the other hand we knew last year. He’s another guy that has had so many injuries this year. Every time we thought about bringing him up there was something wrong with him. It’s good that he’s here.”

Q: Jagr was talking today about having to wait until you guys made a decision or found out in preseason about if Sutter would sign with you guys. Do you think that was the biggest issue in why he left? Was there interest in bringing him back?

“Yeah we were talking. We made an offer to Jaromir back in February. It just didn’t go anywhere, and then we decided to wait until after the season was over. Then we talked a number of times between the end of the year and free agency. I had talked to his agent, he called me that day, that Jaromir signed with Dallas and was getting quotes, asking where are you guys at. At the time we weren’t in a position to do anything because we had offers on another guy. So obviously he did what he did.”

Q: Paul, the inability to fight through were your words is what good teams do, is that your number one goal in the offseason, to Identify why you weren’t able to fight through like another good team?

“Yeah, Our consistent play among other things. There were many things we didn’t do. We’ll sit down and talk with the players and coaches in the group and then coaches individually. Come up with a game plan and try and get better.”

Q: I know it’s a small sample but what are your impressions of Steve Mason so far?

“I think he’s played terrific. I believe he’s playing great. Another good plus with 3 or 4 young defensemen in front of him and see how he does.”